


Of Sea-Spray, Like Ghosts

by smallashes



Series: Artefacts [3]
Category: Black Sails
Genre: Angst, Gen, M/M, One-Shot, post-plantation, post-reunion, working through trauma on a trans-atlantic trip
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-27
Updated: 2019-10-27
Packaged: 2021-01-04 20:47:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21203861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smallashes/pseuds/smallashes
Summary: James and Thomas confront their years apart, and scramble to find themselves again.





	Of Sea-Spray, Like Ghosts

**Author's Note:**

> I should be writing a novel, but here we are ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

When James and Thomas step aboard the ship to journey them back to England, they exchange hesitant glances, acknowledge unspoken words. James did not know why he was compelled to return to the Empire when they discussed it months ago and he still cannot explain the pull he feels toward England. Or perhaps it is a repulsion from the New World. Thomas encouraged him to do what he felt was right, although the thought still eats away at him, as though there isn’t a world where he would feel at home.

For a moment, as the sway of the ship catches a familiar memory in James’ step, he wonders if home is here at sea.

That perhaps he may lie in the depths; down, down into the consuming darkness.

That his soul may return to the waters he gave so much of his life to; blood spilled from his hand and at his hand, sacrificial and fleeting like a breath before baptism.

Thomas places a hand on James’ shoulder and squeezes reassuringly. They boarded as cousins under the name of Barlow, in memory of Miranda whom they had both loved so dearly. Yet James still feels like Flint beneath the shield of the Barlow name and he wonders, too, when he will feel like McGraw again.

The sun rises to its midday peak over twinkling waters and the bustling colonial port as the ship’s crew raises the anchor and sets its sails north, across the Atlantic. James and Thomas settle at the rails, starboard, watching the coastline of the Carolinas pull away in the distance.

“It must be strange for you,” starts Thomas with a small grin. “To be on a ship and not at its helm.”

In truth, James knows Thomas is only being playful. But he’d been thinking of that for days – weeks, even, when they first decided they were leaving the colonies. To be on a ship again as a passenger, shuffled from one continent to another, rather than leading it through dangerous waters and across the perilous seas.

“That may be for the benefit of everyone on board,” James replies, forcing himself to match Thomas’ grin. He may no longer feel the circumstances that created Flint, but Flint is a shell, a mask; hardened around his being as whatever’s left of James McGraw _tap-tap-taps_ away from the inside.

†

James and Thomas aren’t the only passengers on this ship. There is a mother and her two small children, an elderly Scottish man, an Irish teenager loudly questioning his decision to return to Britain. Thomas watches them; observes and records. He thinks that, perhaps, writing down the mundanity will help him restructure his thoughts, reorganize the world in his eyes. He wants to return to England without an ounce of the awkwardness he’s accumulated from his time at Bedlam and on the plantation. The months they spent in the Carolinas earning money for this trip made him hyper-aware of the loss of his humanity, that civilization had progressed while he was shut away from the world. James disagreed, but nonetheless Thomas writes. Words on a page are observable, comprehensible. He’ll make sense of it all soon enough.

A little girl approaches him, her mother and brother not far behind. She is curious about his journal, bending down to look at the cover as Thomas has it open to write. He smiles and says hello.

The girl freezes, caught too close to a stranger and not as invisible as she thought. Her face goes red.

“Charlotte!” calls her mother. “Please don’t bother the man.” She ushers Charlotte away, next to her brother. “I’m so sorry.”

Thomas smiles. “Not at all. Does she want to look?” He closes the journal, holds it out for her to feel. Charlotte steps forward, hesitantly, running her hands over the leather cover; forbidden but endlessly tempting. She tries to pry it open, but Thomas keeps the book shut. Not once will he let this out of his possession, not even to this little girl; there are secrets within its pages he doesn’t dare reveal to anyone but James. “My name is Thomas,” he says. “Barlow. My cousin and I are returning home.”

The woman laughs sharply, bitterly. “Sick of the colonies too?” she asks. “I’m Margaret. This is Charlotte and John. Surnames are unimportant since mine belongs to my bastard of a husband.”

“Does anyone ever leave the colonies because they’re sick of it?” says Thomas.

Margaret softens. “S’pose not,” she says. “I just want to take the kids away, somewhere where they can be children. Have an aunt back in York who can help me take care of them. And you, sir?”

Thomas pauses, remembering the story he had fabricated some time ago. “My wife passed while I was away,” he says. This much is true, though he glances at James in the distance, reminded that James had witnessed Miranda’s last moments. “We’re going to pay our respects.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” says Margaret, pulling her children close to her. “I s’pose no one leaves the colonies if you aren’t a lost soul.”

†

James finds himself returning to old habits. He doesn’t mean to, and he watches Thomas write in his journal with a tinge of envy and longing. He wishes he could join him, to sit next to Thomas as he writes. But that would be dangerous on this ship; privacy is a luxury they have not been granted. And so, James finds himself below decks, helping tend to the sails amongst the crew.

The physicality is familiar, comforting. He may not be at the helm, but being among the cogs of the ship feels like a memory, cloudy and distant and content. He busies himself with the masts, entangled in the knots and the ropes, letting muscle memory guide him from his days in the Navy. Long before he moved up the ranks. Long, long ago before he was a captain.

James slips in with the crew easily enough until the captain stops him with a hand on his chest and a look more of confusion than of anger. “You’re one of my passengers here, aren’t you?” he asks.

“Aye,” replies James, cautiously. He looks around, guarded, though no one else seems to give them privy.

“I take it you’re a sailor?”

“Was. I was Navy before I retired.” He pauses, wondering if he should give his rank. He was a captain once, but that was not with the Navy. “Lieutenant,” he says finally.

The captain nods, smiling. “A pleasure to have you on board, Lieutenant. I am Captain Huttlestone.” He shakes James’ hand. “You should heed your retirement. My men have this ship well taken care of. That is, unless you’re restless. Do you still feel the pull of a ship at sea, Lieutenant? Does she beckon you with promises of rocking waves and a kiss of sea-spray in your face?”

“Something like that,” says James. He squints as he looks up the masts, superimposing his memory of the _Walrus_ overtop the sight before him. It occurs to him that this cargo ship, carrying both goods and passengers, would have once been target of men like him. He suddenly feels very naked without a weapon at his side.

Huttlestone follows his gaze. “I will insist you spend this trip as a passenger,” he says. “But I will also inform my crew of your presence in case you do still join them.”

†

The days pass slowly though the weeks seem to spiral into each other, tumbling into months as though it meant anything more to them than a new moon. James and Thomas have fleeting moments alone together, although they make time to talk in the drawing darkness of the night, all to themselves on the upper decks.

And though their only audience are the moon and the stars and the waves below, neither dare raise their voices above a whisper, echoing of the water crashing against the hull.

They look at each other in what little light they have, tongues heavy and the air pregnant with unspoken questions from years of separation. Things they have not yet addressed since they reunited at the plantation.

James feels a burden being here, next to Thomas. He still feels the weight of his years as Flint, that life holding strong over a form he’s long forgotten. Or at least, a form of himself he’s tried to hard to maintain but let drift away. He knows that Thomas deserves McGraw, not Flint. That he has not yet shed Flint and he doesn’t know how. That they cannot simply return to how things were before England ripped their happiness away.

Thomas senses the shift. He’s sensed it every night since their return, but his mind has since betrayed him; words no longer come to him so easily. The language he once used must now be plucked through the thorns and brambles, and thoughts form without a way for him to verbalize. The journal has helped some, but to Thomas, he has become an echo of his former self; he is Thomas without his title and education, a lord without his salon and land and – _God,_ did he even care for that? The very institution he upheld was so quick to bury him with the poor and mad in Bedlam.

James breaks their silence. “One day,” he says.

Thomas hums in reply. “One day until what? Do you believe we may ever be what we were?”

James raises his head to the sky and breathes in the night air. He closes his eyes and pretends for a moment the sea-spray off the ocean are speckles of light from the stars above. “I believe I waged a war in memory of what we were,” he says. “Not to bring it back but to create a place where England could not touch, where what we had could not be taken away.”

“But you didn’t know I wasn’t dead.”

“I suppose it was more of a hypothetical. For others, perhaps. That life had ended for me.”

“And yet, here we are.”

_Here._ The idea of _here_ is somehow far away; James still feels them so distantly apart, despite their standing almost shoulder-to-shoulder. He tells himself this isn’t the place, that here at sea he cannot simply let himself be _James._ He looks down into the swirling void and then again to Thomas, illuminated in a halo of the moonlight.

Thomas sighs. He pries James away from the railing, examining his partner in the low-light of night. “What has become of us?” he mutters quietly to himself, barely more than a breath to the wind.

†

Thomas has always wondered what James sees in the sea. It hadn’t been so clear when they had first met, all those years ago in London. His life in the Admiralty was almost separate from what he chose to show when James visited their home, dined with them, loved them. And yet now Thomas sees its pull on James, like an ever-present shadow on the man he once knew.

Thomas writes this down as the old Scottish man, Mallory, takes a seat next to him. They sit side by side on crates on the port side, the tops of their heads just breaching the railings. Mallory is muttering contentedly to himself. It takes a moment before Thomas realizes Mallory is talking about him.

“…not often you run into educated men ‘round here. Usually, they got their troubles they can’t leave instead of travellin’ for work ‘cause they can’t catch something that pays.”

Thomas puts down his pen, closes his book, and looks over to Mallory who eyes him back. He opens his mouth to reply – words caught on lip and tongue – before Mallory continues:

“I noticed you’ve been writing this entire trip. Wondered what exactly you’ve got in there.”

“I suppose I’m simply trying to make sense of the world,” Thomas replies.

“So you’re a philosopher?”

Thomas, taken aback, blinks. Were the works of literature he held so dearly not philosophy in their words? To make sense of the world, therein through the eyes of the author? What an ostentatious thought; he isn’t a philosopher in his own right, but has he not already studied the subject thoroughly? Could this not be a work of its own, however early in its theory and understanding?

“You don’t need to give me an answer,” says Mallory with a grin. “Just thought I’d give you something else to think about for your book there. We’ve got lots of time to think and contemplate here on this voyage.”

“Of course,” says Thomas, slowly. The journal in his lap feels heavy with newfound potential; it is a world to be seen anew, a familiar night sky with new constellations.

†

James wakes with the sailors. He lets himself have a few moments to himself each morning, feigning sleep in his hammock as the cogs of the ship begin their day. His hands have calloused again from rope and climbing and wood. It reminds him of his early years, a sailor himself low in the ranks of the Admiralty. A step closer to McGraw, though in his skin and beard and hair, he is still Flint. James greets Flint begrudgingly whenever his joints ache, whenever his hands give out. He cannot continue to pretend he is a young James McGraw, promisingly young and fresh to the seas.

When the grey of the morning rolls into churning clouds and distant lightning, James stands above decks amongst the crew, staring down a storm that's dark and angry though hardly a ship-killer. James estimates, based off the winds and the distance at the horizon, that they are many miles away still; there is time, he thinks, for it to dissipate. But the storm is wide, stretching its fingers across the sky and sea. He searches for Captain Huttlestone, who stands on the quarterdeck grim-faced and thinking.

“We could sail through it,” says Huttlestone. “Divert our path some, to avoid the heart of it, of course.”

James assess the storm; first through the eyes of Captain Flint, whose first instinct was once to sail through an impossible storm to survive it out to spite, then through a far less spiteful Lieutenant McGraw, who knows to be rational with the crew and passengers and cargo. “I fear this storm may still grow,” he says, though he knows, looking ahead, that the storm itself is inevitable. There is no way around it, and he feels the winds on their ships, so many miles away. He thinks, too, that stopping would be unwise.

“I’ll get us through,” says Huttlestone. “Hardly a trip across the Atlantic goes by without a storm. Go under with the other passengers. We’re well-equipped up here.”

James knows this isn’t his place anymore. He knows he is not captain of this ship, knows he is not a member of its crew. Huttlestone has his own first mate, someone he knows and trusts and therefore doesn’t need counsel from an ex-Navy officer-turned-pirate.

And so, feeling somewhat useless, James heads below deck.

Lanterns are lit in the cabins, casting a soft – yet cold – glow. With each step James takes, the wood underfoot creaks, just as his bones, under years of stress at sea and yet another on-coming storm. He finds Thomas tucked away, journal in his lap, pen in his hand; here, the lantern-light is warm as it encompasses the love of his life in quiet contemplation of world.

A wave crashes hard against the hull. He hears Margaret comforting her children somewhere else in the cabin, hears Mallory shout an incomprehensible exclamation, and Finn – the teenager – muttering to himself amongst the rustling of blankets.

James waits to ensure they are alone, out of sight of the others. They sit surrounded by crates and nets set out to dry; comfortable, if still smelling of fish. Somewhere, out there, the ship’s goat bleats restlessly.

“All is well?” asks Thomas.

“As the captain says,” replies James.

“But your instinct tells you otherwise.”

“Storms are hard to predict,” says James, slipping into Flint. “The clouds, the winds, the rain – they can look like a beast from afar and turn into rain with only some slight winds. Or the lion remains a lion and stands its ground indiscriminate of what may seek passage.”

“And Captain Huttlestone believes it’s the former but you fear for the latter, is that it?”

“The storm is wide. There isn’t a viable way around it. Nor is sitting to wait it out an option – it’s moving toward us.” James shakes his head, places a hand on Thomas’ knee, and mutters: “I’m going back up. Best case scenario, Huttlestone doesn’t need my help. Worst case scenario… I’ve navigated the _Walrus_ through worse.”

“How do you know this won’t be worse than those?”

James holds Thomas’ head and kisses him briefly before rising to his feet. Not long enough to savour their first kiss in months, but not long enough that anyone would have seen. And in their position, as passengers stuck aboard this ship for months, that is all that matters. “I don’t,” says James.

†

“I thought I told you to remain below decks!” calls Huttlestone from the wheel as he sees James re-emerge from below.

“I reckon a storm could use all hands on deck,” James replies, raising his voice above the roar of the winds and the crashing of the waves. He swallows his instinct as a captain and asks where he can be stationed. It’s been long since he took orders rather than giving them.

With some reluctance, Huttlestone nods and sends James to join the others, ready, at the mast. They watch the storm in the distance, as the great beast rolls onward and outward, outstretching above the sea.

The storm hits as James expects. The rain starts as a drizzle before turning into a downpour that hits like a wall, and the ship’s sails fight for each yard forward against the wind. The first wave to hit them hard knocks James off his balance for the first time in years, its waters spraying from against the hull. The crew are battered, from the heavens on high and the swirling depths beneath; as above, so below.

The wind catches their sails, tilting the ship onto its side; the masts graze the ocean surface, and James holds on through gritted teeth and aching muscles. He climbs back to his feet when the ship re-stabilizes, helps pull the masts clear of the winds, and searches for Huttlestone amongst the chaos.

The storm has muted the world, made its existence above all; it’s all roaring thunder and crashing waves, rain battering against wood, the cacophony of the crew as they work together to survive.

It’s dark, but James spots Huttlestone’s red jacket through the water that pours over his eyes. He strains at the wheel, struggling to keep their trajectory. James joins him unwaveringly. He stands next to Huttlestone and they pull at the wheel together.

Huttlestone shouts his gratitude. “Have you seen storms like this, Lieutenant?”

Of course he has, he thinks. He’s seen storms of this calibre and storms degrees above it. He almost lost his ship and crew in a storm so much worse than their current; stranded them in the ocean and circling the waters for days on rations unexpected of their flight. James replies in earnest: “I’ve seen worse,” he calls in return.

He remembers how reckless he was that day, recalls how anger characterized Flint’s decisions. Here, he only wants to survive. For himself, for Thomas. For the life they may lead ahead of them. Here, Flint’s experience serves to protect, his spite his drive to defy the storm.

†

Thomas watches Finn pace within the cabin despite the swaying and toppling of the ship. He’s close enough to the boy (or perhaps the boy is simply loud enough) that he can hear Finn’s muttering:

“This is God’s doing, isn’t it? Telling me I made a mistake. Should’ve stayed in Boston, should never have travelled south. God, God, God! Can You hear me? Where am I to go, if I don’t belong in the colonies? Or in Britain? What’s there left for me in Ireland? What am I? God, what am I?”

†

James breathes in again the sea-spray air when the winds die down and rain dwindles into spatter. He feels the coolness beyond the humidity, smells the brightness of the ocean at peace. The sun breaks through the clouds at the horizon, flecks of red and pink and orange in broad strokes of oils on a canvas.

He’s soaked. Water continues to drip down his hair and onto his forehead, sliding across the bridge of his nose and past his lips onto his beard. He feels the water especially when he returns below decks and Thomas’ face lights up with concern.

“Come,” says James. “It’s beautiful out.”

Thomas leaves his journal tucked away in his belongings. James lets him go first, to avoid the trail of water James inevitably leaves behind, and they emerge above deck, the evening light drawing pink along the puddles that litter the ship.

“One day,” says James. “One day, I won’t feel so guilty.”

“For what?” Thomas lowers his voice. “For us?”

“Myself. For Flint.” He looks Thomas in the eyes and nods. He’ll be better. For Thomas. “One day.”

The two of them make their way to the rail at the stern. They watch as the storm disperses, giving way to glowing red skies and stars above in the quiet creeping of dusk.

Thomas smiles. “One day.”

**Author's Note:**

> All my poetry went into writing these two. I'm out of pretty language, it's been drained OTL
> 
> If... Other fic ideas come to mind, hmu @smerkatsya on tumblr


End file.
